After a frantic finish to the NBA regular season, the Nuggets were left feeling pretty good about themselves. Just a week ago, it felt like the sky was falling in Denver. The team was on a four-game losing streak, Jamal Murray missed six straight games with a hamstring injury, and as a cherry on top, the owners shockingly fired head coach Michael Malone and GM Calvin Booth with just three games left on the schedule.
In many ways, it felt like the Nuggets’ season was over with those stunning moves last Tuesday. But give a lot of credit to interim head coach David Adelman, his staff, and the players for rallying together and winning the last three games of the season. That included a big road win in Houston on the final day of the season to clinch the four-seed in the Western Conference.
That win meant that the Nuggets would not have to go through the play-in tournament, they locked up homecourt advantage in the first round of the playoffs, and they avoided the dreaded matchup with the team that has owned them recently, the Timberwolves.
Clippers pose matchup nightmare for Nuggets
Amid all the celebrating, it was easy to lose sight of the fact that the Nuggets’ first-round opponent is no slouch. The Clippers have been playing some of the best basketball in the league, they’re finally healthy, and they seem to be peaking at the right time.
The Nuggets really only have two plus defenders in the starting lineup in Aaron Gordon and Christian Braun. AG has historically done well on Kawhi but he has fallen off slightly on that end and will certainly have his hands full. Likewise, Braun has been solid but Harden is a tough ask for the kid.
But the real problems lie beyond that as there aren’t many places to hide for Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. One of them will be overtasked with trying to guard the secondary options like Norman Powell and Bogdan Bogdanovic. And both Murray and Porter Jr. will be attacked relentlessly on switches and in pick-and-roll.
The Nuggets are going to need to get better perimeter defenders on the floor, but turning to Peyton Watson and Russell Westbrook runs the risk of tanking the offense. Unfortunately, the Nuggets have no real answer for this problem. They can try to hide guys on players like Kris Dunn and Derrick Jones Jr., but the Clippers are smart and well-coached; they are going to put the right offensive weapons on the floor to target weaknesses.
At the end of the day, the Nuggets players are just going to have to step up and guard. Murray and MPJ are good athletes and they have the size to stay competitive on that end. They have to stay committed to it and they have to stay engaged. The Clippers’ defense is way too good for Denver to drop the rope and start bleeding easy baskets on the other end.